Leagues

I have been cruising the various leagues' sites, reading the rules and so forth. Now I'm wondering if there is any league in particular I should try to join, like a rookie league, or barring that, a league that particularly wants/needs new members?

Lot's of leagues currently need coaches. I"m the Commish of the WFL, and we could use a few right now(4?). We may have to contract the league at the end of this season because we do not have enough coaches. Nearly all leagues will take new coaches, many will suggest they coach with a veteran for a while to get up to speed.

There is a rookie league, per Se, the NCFL has two divisions, simulating some aspects of college football. The 1AA league, or Pioneer division is for new coaches, and the champ of the league has the chance to be the last seed in the 1A playoffs, so any team could still pull off the championship. For rookie coaches who just want to get their feet wet, the NCFL's 1AA division is my number one suggestion.

Then there are the semi-veteran coaches... who have coached before, and just need to figure out the differences, and get up to speed. I personally think they can handle any league, even a difficult league like the WFL. There are style differences in any league, so if you have preferences in style of play, you might want to pick through your league carefully.

I'm always ready to help any coach find a team in a league, even if it's not a league I"m in. PMFB needs active coaches, so helping those who are just getting started is what I think of as my key.

I am the Athletic director for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish these days, but you might see me on the field somewhere.

The season is about midway through, there are some static 1A teams, probably that's what you would do for the first season is take over a static 1A team, and then compete at 1AA next season under your own school name.

Good luck, if there is anything else I can do feel free to holler or post

In very basic terms, a coach's job is to prepare a playbook that conforms to a league's rules and submit it by the deadline specified by the league, to manage the team file (usually the league will supply you with the team and you have to manage it from there; i.e. draft p layers, decide on who starts and what position they'll play, etc.), and some will require you to run a game every now and then and write up a report on the game for the rest of the league.

So, if a league gives me a team, do they give me the current playbook and AI settings, and I can tweak these from week to week? Or do I tweak them once at the start of a season, and let them play from there?

Also, in terms of drafting players...how does that work? If a player is drafted, I create them in my team file?

I apologize if the questions are basic, but as I said, I am very new to this. I just remember playing the game with set teams/playbooks (included with the game) on the Mac a long time ago...

No, the playbook, plays and AI are all your own. As for just tweaking them at the beginning of the season....well, you could try that, but if it's in any league with weekly uploads you'll get your head handed to you. You'd want to change up your AI and/or plays each week to suit each individual opponent.

As for drafting players, the method varies with each league, but yes, you'd then add them to your team file in whatever slot they were going to fill.

Feel free to ask any other questions you have or you can email me directly (you can get the address by clicking the envelope icon under my name here in the forum) and I'll be happy to help you as much as I can.

You draft and aquire players to fill your roster. You create your team file out of the players that are on your roster. Most leagues have lifespans for the careers for players... many have players degrade as they get older. The NCFL is a college league and the lifespan for players is only 5 years maximum.

I'd be happy to help anyone who has questions about leagues, and have a few documents I've written over the years on the subject that might help. Maybe I'll post a couple of them later.